Anima Mundi: symbolic culture as a medium for the psyche

Journal title STUDI JUNGHIANI
Author/s Warren Colman
Publishing Year 2017 Issue 2016/44 Language Italian
Pages 19 P. 30-48 File size 235 KB
DOI 10.3280/JUN2016-044004
DOI is like a bar code for intellectual property: to have more infomation click here

Below, you can see the article first page

If you want to buy this article in PDF format, you can do it, following the instructions to buy download credits

Article preview

FrancoAngeli is member of Publishers International Linking Association, Inc (PILA), a not-for-profit association which run the CrossRef service enabling links to and from online scholarly content.

Whilst the loss of a sense of living connection with the material world is mainly associated with the scientific revolution in seventeenth century Europe, it can be traced back to Plato’s introduction of a hierarchy between soul and body. Jung’s attempted solution to this - esse in anima - is ingenious but maintains the Cartesian split by which the aliveness of the world is reduced to a projection of psychic forces (the archetypes). An alternative approach is proposed, rooted in the Aristotelean emphasis on practical activity that sees the soul as a function of our way of being in the world. Human cognition is extended and distributed by our social and material engagement with the world, especially via collective representations whose symbolic character is constitutive of the reality of the world in which we live. Despite the dominance of "scientific Cartesian" representations in the modern Western world, there remain numerous instances of participation mystique that cannot be captured by the Cartesian notion of projection. These indicate an opening to ways of being in the world that may lead us out of the impasse of the Cartesian matrix.

Keywords: Anima mundi, Cartesian split, collective representations, constitutive symbols, distributed cognition, participation mystique.

  1. Carpenter A.D. (2008). Embodying intelligence. Animals and us in Plato’s Timaeus. In: Dillon J., Zovko M.-E., eds. Platonism and Forms of Intelligence. Berlin: Akademie Verlag.
  2. Clark A., Chalmers C. (1998). The extended mind. Analysis 58: 1, 7-19.
  3. Colman W. (2011). Synchronicity and the meaning-making psyche. Journal of Analytical Psychology, 56, 4: 471-491.
  4. Colman W. (2015). A revolution of the mind: some implications of George Hogenson’s “The Baldwin Effect: a neglected influence on C. G. Jung’s evolutionary thinking”. (2001). Journal of Analytical Psychology, 60, 4: 520-539.
  5. Colman W. (2016). Act and Image. The Emergence of Symbolic Imagination. New Orleans, LA: Spring Journal Books.
  6. Deacon T. (1997). The Symbolic Species: The Co-Evolution of Language and the Brain. New York: W.W. Norton & Co (trad. it. La specie simbolica: coevoluzione di linguaggio e cervello. Roma: Fioriti, 2001).
  7. Abram D. (1997). The Spell of the Sensuous: Perception and Language in a More-Than-Human World. New York: Vintage Books.
  8. Descartes R. (2009). Letter to Princess Elisabeth, May 21, 1643. In: Warren K.J., ed. An Unconventional History of Western Philosophy: Conversations Between Men and Women Philosophers. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield.
  9. Elias N. (2011). The Symbol Theory. In: Kilminster R., ed. The Collected Works of Norbert Elias. Dublin: University College Dublin Press.
  10. Gallagher S. (2012). The Over-Extended Mind. Versus, 113: 57-68.
  11. Geertz C. (1973). The interpretation of Cultures. New York: Basic Books (trad. it. Interpretazione di culture. Bologna: Il Mulino, 1998).
  12. Hornborg A. (2006). Animism, fetishism, and objectivism as strategies for knowing (or not knowing) the World. Ethnos: Journal of Anthropology 71, 1: 21-32.
  13. Hutchins E. (1995). Cognition in the Wild. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
  14. Jung C.G. (1921). Psychologischen Typen (trad. it. Tipi psicologici. In: Opere, vol. 6. Torino: Bollati Boringhieri, 1969).
  15. Jung C.G. (1926). Geist und Leben (trad. it. Spirito e vita. In: Opere, vol. 8. Torino: Bollati Boringhieri, 1976).
  16. Jung C.G. (1936). Wotan (trad. it. Wotan. In: Opere, vol. 10. Torino: Bollati Boringhieri, 1985).
  17. Jung C.G. (1938/1940). Psychologie und Religion (The Terry Lectures) (trad. it. Psicologia e religione. In: Opere, vol. 11. Torino: Bollati Boringhieri, 1979).
  18. Jung C.G. (1939-1954). Kommentar zu “Das Geheimnis der Goldenen Blüte” (trad. it. Commento al “Segreto del fiore d’oro”. In: Opere, vol. 13. Torino: Bollati Boringhieri, 1988).
  19. Jung C.G. (2009). The Red Book. Liber Novus. In: Shamdasani S., ed. London & New York: W. W. Norton (trad. it. Il libro rosso. Liber novus. Edizione studio, a cura e con introduzione di S. Shamdasani. Torino: Bollati Boringhieri, 2010 e 2012).
  20. Lévy-Bruhl L. (1910). Les fonctions mentales dans les sociétés inférieures. Paris: Alcan (trad. it. Psiche e società primitive. Roma: Newton Compton, 1975).
  21. Malafouris L. (2013). How Things Shape the Mind: A Theory of Material Engagement. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
  22. Merchant J. (2012). Shamans and Analysts: New Insights on the Wounded Healer. London: Routledge.
  23. Platone (1951). Il simposio. Santarcangelo di Romagna: Rusconi.
  24. Platone (2008). Timeo. Milano: Rizzoli.
  25. Renfrew C. (2008). Prehistory. The Making of the Human Mind. London: Phoenix (trad. it. Preistoria. L’alba della mente umana. Torino: Einaudi, 2011).
  26. Searle J. (1995). The Construction of Social Reality. New York: Simon and Schuster (trad. it. La costruzione della realtà sociale. Torino: Einaudi, 2006).
  27. Segal R. (2007). Jung and Lévy-Bruhl. Journal of Analytical Psychology, 52, 5: 635-658.
  28. Swinburne R. (2000). Nature and immortality of the soul. In: Concise Routledge Encyclopaedia of Philosophy. London and New York: Routledge.
  29. Thompson E. (2007). Mind in Life. Biology, Phenomenology and the Sciences of Mind. Cambridge, MA. & London: Harvard University Press.
  30. Tomasello M. (2008). Origins of Human Communication. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press (trad. it. Le origini della comunicazione umana. Milano: R. Cortina, 2009).

Warren Colman, Anima Mundi: cultura simbolica come medium per la psiche in "STUDI JUNGHIANI" 44/2016, pp 30-48, DOI: 10.3280/JUN2016-044004